Challenger Questions JJJ's 'Home'

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Now that Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. is out of the hospital, his political opponents are going back on the offensive. Congressional challenger Brian Woodworth released a press release hours after the news broke that Jackson Jr. left the Mayo Clinic and returned “home.”

"My campaign was called earlier to get a response about the fact Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr., had left the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, bypassed Illinois and went straight ‘home’ to Washington, D.C., to 'convalesce,'" Woodworth stated in the release.

While Woodworth expresses his "joy" over the news, he takes exception to the language Jackson Jr.'s chief of staff used in a Chicago Tribune report describing the Congressman’s home being in Washington, D.C.

"Perhaps Congressman Jackson returned to Washington, D.C., to face his pending Congressional Ethics hearing?" Questioned Woodworth in the release.

It's his way of pointing out the curious circumstances surrounding Jackson's choice to return to the Nation's Capital over Second Congressional District, where the Congressman is up for reelection this November.

Jackson Jr., 47, has been on leave for three month. He suddenly left his post as Illinois' second district representative on June 10 and checked into an Arizona substance abuse clinic.

About a month later, he checked into the Mayo Clinic seeking treatment for bipolar disorder.